


Watch by Moonlight

by firecat



Category: Original Work
Genre: Clothing Kink, Conspiracy, Crossdressing, Frottage, Happy Ending, Long Hair, Manhunt - Freeform, Minor Character Death, Nipple Play, Non-Penetrative Sex, Oral Sex, Other, Outdoor Sex, Revenge, Semi-Public Sex, Soldiers, Story within a Story, Strap-Ons, Taverns, thieves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:54:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26763919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firecat/pseuds/firecat
Summary: The innkeepers' daughter is very taken by the mysterious person the townspeople call "the highwayman." But what might this person require of her if she acts on her attraction?
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Nonbinary Character
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7
Collections: Yes Fest 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Guinevak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guinevak/gifts).



> Thanks for the great prompts! Hope you enjoy this!
> 
> See end-notes for specifics about the nonbinary character.
> 
> Based loosely on two ballads:
> 
> “The Highwayman” by Alfred Noyes, as performed by Loreena McKennitt  
> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGFo0xn4JeY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGFo0xn4JeY%22)  
> [https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43187/the-highwayman](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43187/the-highwayman%22)
> 
> “On the Road to Fairfax County” by David Massengill, as performed by The Roches  
> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GawyW1BqmEI>  
> <https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/roches/ontheroadtofairfaxcounty.html>

_He'd a French cocked hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin  
A coat of claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin;  
They fitted with never a wrinkle; his boots were up to the thigh!  
And he rode with jeweled twinkle  
His pistol butts a-twinkle  
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky_

“He’s back! He’s back!”

It was midsummer. Most of the young women and not a few of the young men of the town were passing around the news. The handsome, mysterious traveler who was so free with his coin had returned. 

Bess, youngest of the innkeeper’s three daughters, first knew about it when she saw his horse in the inn’s stable. The mare was jet-black and taller than any other she’d seen, seventeen hands. Bess had seen none other like her. Even before you added in the fine saddle, pad, and bridle. 

Many found excuses to stop by the inn that day. Bess needed none. 

She’d taken extra time plaiting her long black hair, and applied a hint of red to her cheeks and lips. Her parents would not approve, but they would not notice as long as Bess didn’t draw attention to herself. Their work at the inn was never-ending.

As she served, she found many excuses to pass by the stranger, to admire and even to brush against his coat of claret velvet. 

She was just slipping past him with handfuls of used flagons for washing when he caught her upper arm. She gasped and almost dropped her load. 

“Sir! You startled me! What can I do for you?” she said. They weren’t the saucy, inviting words she’d imagined herself saying to him. 

He drew her close to his face. His eyes flashed into hers, and her whole body suddenly shuddered. “Refill my flagon, if you please,” he said. His voice was soft and husky, refined, higher-pitched than she’d imagined, but no less thrillingly masculine. “And I would know your name, for ‘innkeepers’ daughter’ is no fit greeting.”

“I am called Bess, sir,” she told him. 

He took hold of one of her plaits then, drawing it through his fingers.

“You would look well with a red ribbon in your braid, Bess,” he said. 

“Thank you, sir.”

She should shake off his hand and go, but she found herself unable to move. His scent, foreign and spicy, filled her nostrils. Her lips parted slightly as if to taste it.

“Off with you,” he said, slapping her upper arm lightly. 

Bess startled back to alertness and scurried off, her arm tingling where he’d touched it. 

Caerwen, her eldest sister, gave her a squinty-eyed look as she came near to fill a jug. 

“Flirting with the highwayman? Have a care, sister.”

“He only wants more ale,” she protested.

“And why did he have to whisper in your ear to say that, instead of waving his flagon in the air like everybody else?”

“Perhaps where he comes from, that’s considered uncouth. Besides, we don’t actually know he’s a highwayman.”

“What else would he be,” retorted Caerwen, “coming round a backwater like this time and again, alone, with so much coin that his breeches jingle with every step?”

“And you tell _me_ to have a care. I haven’t been sneaking after him listening to his breeches. What would Rhoda say?”

“Shut your mouth, wench, or I’ll shut it for you. And leave my fiancée out of it.”

When Bess approached him with the jug, he seems preoccupied. But just as she turned to go, his hand clasped her free one. 

His palm was rough where the reins would touch it, but so soft elsewhere that Bess thought of flower petals. 

“Wear this for me, if you will,” he said in his quiet, hoarse voice. “In your hair.”

She glanced at her hand. In it lay a roll of fine red ribbon. Bess quickly thrust it into the pocket of her apron. 

Bess was too busy or too closely scrutinized that night to find time to plait the ribbon into her hair.

In the morning, the stranger and his fine horse were gone. 

~~~

It was drawing close to the end of harvest-time when rumors of the stranger’s return flew again. Bess retrieved the ribbon from where she had hidden it inside her mattress. (Nothing so fine would remain in her possession unhidden.) She was at pains to find a moment to steal away and plait the ribbon into her hair. 

The inn was festive that night. All were celebrating the bountiful harvest. Bess was usually invisible at such times, whisking among the guests, keeping flagons filled and platters of bread on the long tables. She enjoyed the flow of conversation, gossip, argument. She deftly fended off drunken attempts to lay hands on her person, sidestepped invitations to join in the drinking, with friendly teasing: “I know you’d rather have the jug around again than my company this night, lassie.”

But tonight it was as if she were wearing the moon in her hair, the way eyes turned to her, inviting or inquisitive or calculating. Or, in the case of her family, disapproving.

“Where did you come by that ribbon, Bess?” her mother asked.

“A customer gave it me,” she said truthfully. Then denied recalling which one.

Bess was scarcely able to approach the stranger all night, for he sat in a corner away from the crowd, which was demanding all her attention. On several occasions one of her sisters served him instead. 

As the tavern erupted in a drunken squabble, she slipped toward his corner. 

He scarcely looked at her, but picked up the plait with the braid in it, passing it through his fingers as before. 

“I would meet with you this night,” he said, still not looking at her. “If you wish it, find me by the well, after the call of the second hour. Look for me by the moonlight.”

Bess rose that night from the bed she shared with her two sisters, telling them that they would thank her for visiting the privy rather than using the chamber pot. She threw on a cloak that hung by the door for this purpose. 

The stranger was at the well. The nap of his velvet jacket caught the moonlight, the queue of hair that fell from under his cocked hat looked as soft as silk, and his eyes gleamed with high emotion. “Bess,” he whispered. His hand barely brushed hers. “Is there a place near here where we can be unobserved?” 

“Follow me,” Bess told him, and took him to a dark alcove that the young people of the town (and sometimes the not so young) used for kissing games. 

Bess’s body was shivering in anticipation. She hoped that this delicious stranger would want to play a kissing game with her. 

But when she turned her face up to his, parting her lips, he did not respond as she had imagined. Instead he studied her face in the sliver of moonlight penetrating their dark hideaway. 

“Are you the one I need, Bess of the raven hair? You are bold, but are you bold enough?”

“I’m bold enough for the likes o’you, highwayman,” she said, glad she could now use some of the saucy words she’d imagined saying to him. “I would know what to call you.”

“Highwayman will do, though I wonder how you came to name me thus,” the quiet, husky voice replied, with amusement. His hands clasped around her shoulders then, and drew her closer to him. His spicy scent surrounded her once again, dizzying. 

“It’s what we all call you,” she told him. 

“And yet none challenges me? As a thief and a murderer? How is this?”

“You’re generous with your purse, and couth and well spoken, and you’ve not harmed or taken from any that we care about,” suggested Bess. “We are simple folk. The Lord of these parts has soldiers to protect him. That is not our duty.”

He bent over her and she felt his warm breath at her ear. “And if I take you?” he says in a voice that thrills her. “Will I be guilty of a crime against your people then? A crime against your father and mother? A crime against you?” 

“Crime it may be,” Bess whispered. “But if none but I learn you wish to steal what I have of value, you have my promise: none will accuse you.” Her heart pounded in her throat, as his breath caught, and his lips touched her ear. “Oh,” she added, remembering her cautionary ballads, “so long as you do not get me with child.”

The highwayman laughed then, a strange note to it. “Fear not,” he chuckled. 

Finally his mouth was on hers, soft as rose petals, but unyielding in pursuit of her pleasure. One hand played with her plaits, the other swept along her back, to rest just above the swell of her haunches. 

Bess tried to press closer, to feel the length of him, but he would not allow it. Even when he bent her back and his mouth kissed down her throat. Even when his hands parted her cloak and gripped her breasts through her chemise, kneading them. 

She tried next to pull his shirt out of his breeches, but he stymied her there as well. 

“I pleasure you this night, sweet Bess,” he whispered against her mouth, and he held her wrists fast. His other hand slid down her stomach, then lower, between her legs. She gasped as he pressed the heel of his palm there, squeezing with practiced assurance. 

Her gasp was louder when he replaced his hand with his knee. Did he thrust open her legs, or did she mount him? She wasn’t sure. 

“Quiet, my dear. Lest the crime we are committing with your precious person be discovered. Now, ride me, and ride well, for we have many a mile to cover.”

His knee thrust in a steady rhythm between her legs, against the spot there, swollen and throbbing, that she touched on the rare occasions she had privacy. Her hips rose and fell, forward and back against him, as if posting to a horse’s trot. 

Meantime, he kept moving his soft mouth over hers, making quiet sounds of pleasure that quickened as he felt her hips begin to writhe convulsively. 

“So sweet you are, Bess, your mouth like the finest mead,” he murmured. “Let me steal your precious pleasure, and I shall treasure it beyond rubies.” 

And with strong, soft hands on her bare shoulders, he pressed her down harder against his knee, and she felt an explosion of pleasure begin between her legs and spin outward to fill her utterly. He clapped his hand over her mouth just as a cry tore out of her. 

Then he was holding her, his lips pressed to her cheek and temple and hair, and murmuring over and over again: “Richer than the treasure house of a king.” 

They stayed huddled together, wrapped in her cloak, their mouths playing together, until she could ignore the cold late summer night no longer.

“I must away this night, sweet Bess, but look for my return,” he whispered against her mouth, and then he had vanished into the darkness.


	2. Chapter 2

Bess saw him but a few times before the spring. Each time they slipped away and he stole her pleasure again, but refused her his. 

They’d spied out a haybarn that lay mostly quiet during the winter. There the highwayman removed Bess’s frock and chemise, and took her pleasure by kissing her breasts and nipples, his tongue and lips lingering on them until sweetness burst through her. The next time, he did something Bess had scarcely imagined, kissing her between her open legs for what seemed like hours. She poured forth her pleasure, again and again, coaxed by his insistent mouth, until she finally told him he’d need to carry her back to the inn if he didn’t stop. Despite the danger, he seemed to be weighing the options. 

She begged him to let her touch him and please him in return. He only said, “not yet, my sweet. But not never.”

Her father and mother eyed her suspiciously when she returned from these frolics. Perhaps they saw how her face was flushed, or her mouth swollen from rough kissing. They asked her where she’d been, and she made excuses. 

“You’ve been with the highwayman,” accused her younger sister, Sheogh. Bess admitted nothing, but occasionally submitted to her sister’s demands, doing more than her fair share of mucking out the stables, feeding the chickens. 

He came again at the vernal equinox, lambing season. This time he took her in a different direction, into the woods. 

They walked a long way, until he stopped in front of what looked like a mound of briars and tree limbs. Which opened when he pushed it aside, revealing a bower. 

Inside was a mattress, made of straw but covered with the most sumptuous fabrics Bess had ever seen, silken sheets and duvets stuffed with the softest down. 

“Does it please you, my Bess?”

“My highwayman...” she gasped. 

He kissed her then. “It is time you knew my name, Bess. I am called Phillip.”

“Phillip. My Phillip,” she repeated. 

“Bess, I know you’ve been frustrated that I would not let you have my pleasure as I’ve stolen yours. Tonight, you may have me. You may undress me and touch me where you will. But only if you wish it.”

Bess wished it profoundly. 

She was unfamiliar with some of his clothing, the lace at his collar, the fastenings of his coat. He helped her remove them, gazing at her with an expression she’d not seen on his face before...a yearning and vulnerability. 

She covered with kisses and caresses each new part of him that she revealed. 

She was surprised to find that there was more fabric under the shirt. His chest was bound around with linen. He showed her how to unfasten it, and she unwrapped layer after layer. 

When she was finished she looked on him with wonder, the soft skin, creased and reddened where the fabric had compressed it, the breasts, the jutting nipples. 

“Phillip, are you a woman?” she asked. “Do you dress as a man for safety? For pleasure?” 

“Bess, I am not simply a man or a woman. I am both, and neither, and something else entirely. But this is my body, which is similar in most ways to yours. I dress and bind my breasts as I do for freedom of movement, both physical and social. And because it pleases me. I alter my voice for the same reasons.” 

Bess was overcome with his beauty. And with lust she’d never known before. 

“You may touch me, sweet Bess. Any way you wish. But if you do not want to, if who and what I am is too strange and surprising, we can be as we were.” 

Bess responded by placing her mouth on his skin, and taking one soft breast in each hand. 

She drank his pleasure with her hands and mouth, slaking her thirst for him. 

“May I remove your breeches?” Bess asked, breathlessly, and he assented.

What was revealed was indeed similar to how she was formed, but for the harness around his hips, and the object pressed there against his pubis. It was a rigid length, wrapped in the same doeskin as his breeches, and shaped like that which she’d seen on young men she’d played kissing games with. 

He took it out of the harness, and showed her how it was hollow and constructed of seamless metal. 

“I said you may have me tonight, sweet, and this will allow you to have me almost as you would any man. But only if you wish it.”

“Tonight I would have what you were born with, Phillip,” Bess said, surprised by the way her desire made her bold. And so he had her unbuckle the harness and set it aside. And then she kissed his belly, and opened his legs, and feasted on the nectar that poured from inside him, as he had done with her, in the hay, in dead of winter. 

Later, when they lay warm and sated under the duvet, Phillip said, “Bess, I have trusted you with my greatest secret. Would you hear another?”

“Of course, Phillip.”

He told a tale of young love between a man and a woman.

> A sheltered maiden of noble birth was set upon unawares by a thief. But she was trained in the ways of defense and weapons. She disarmed and subdued him.
> 
> She had been taught to show no mercy to thieves on the road. But as she knelt beside his bound body and prepared to slit his throat, she was unaccountably moved. For she saw that he was younger even than she was, parched and pinched with hunger, yet he looked her in the eye proudly as he awaited his death.
> 
> She lowered the knife and spoke to him. “Why do you live this way? Taking what does not belong to you, gold and lives alike?”
> 
> “I am alone in the world, beautiful Lady. My family died at the hand of a Lord, for an inadequate tribute, and I fled. But none trusts a stranger hereabouts. I would starve else. I’m all but starved anyway, not that I expect you would know anything about that.”
> 
> She had not known starvation among men, had only seen it in beasts, but she took pity on him then. Although she did not release him from his bonds, she sat next to him under the oak tree and shared her meal of bread and cheese with him.
> 
> The way he looked at her then stirred something heretofore unknown in her.
> 
> “Beautiful lady,” he whispered. “It is not just food and drink that I am starved of. How I thirst for you.” 
> 
> She knew well enough what he meant, in general outline at least, although she had not participated in such activities herself. She scarce could believe his boldness, bound and at her mercy, yet expressing such desires.
> 
> “I am moved, but I dare not release your bindings,” she told him.
> 
> “You need not,” he replied. “Your touch is what I crave. Your mouth on my mouth. On my skin. Your hands in my hair.”
> 
> Excited by her victory and his words, she touched and tasted him then. And guided by his hoarse whispers, brought parts of her body to his mouth to taste in return. 
> 
> His joyful acceptance of all she offered kindled desire in her. At length she did untie him, and then lay under him, accepting his offering in return, deep inside herself.
> 
> “I would know your name, Lady,” he said. She told him her name was Philomena.
> 
> As the sun fell toward the sea, they lay in each other’s arms and spoke of leaving, going somewhere they would be unknown and unjudged. She had a little gold, she said, and she would bring it that night and meet him under this very oak, and they could away. 
> 
> “Watch for me by the moonlight,” she told him.
> 
> Alas that her caution has been insufficient. When she returned that night with her treasure, she was followed by her father’s men. 
> 
> As she embraced her love, they leapt. Although she fought ferociously to defend him, and slew two of them, she and the young man were outnumbered and overpowered. 
> 
> She didn’t lose all hope. Surely he would end up in the dungeon. Even if she were confined to her rooms, she would find a way to free him.
> 
> And then her father, the Lord, arrived. He told his men to put the noose around her lover’s neck.
> 
> “Let this be a lesson to you, Philomena,” he said. “When noble girls dally with dogs such as this, the dogs suffer for it.”
> 
> “Do not forget me, my love, my Philomena,” were her lover’s final words. Then the rope pulled tight around his neck and he hung dead from the oak tree, under which they had loved.

Bess wipes away tears as he finishes the tale. “Phillip...are you Philomena?”

“I was,” he assents simply. “I ran away that very night, though the Lord my father set half a dozen guards upon my chambers. I have been running ever since. Seeking...balm. Forgetfulness. Revenge. I have found the first in you. I have all but given up forgetting. That will come when this body lies dead.”

“And revenge?”

“I am dedicated to my father’s downfall. I have harried him these years, stealing his prized possessions, his money, his peace of mind. I will finally steal his power. His influence. I shall not kill him. Let him live his remaining years knowing what it is to be diminished. To be cast out.”

“How are you going to steal his power?” Bess wants to know.

“For that I need an accomplice. And that is why I’ve told you all this, my dear. There is none that I trust but you. I trust you not to reveal this information. But, having come to care for you, I am now loathe to put you in even the slightest danger.”

“What does the accomplice need to do?”

“To pass on a letter, in person, to a specific person. That is all.”

“I will do it, Phillip, if it will release you from your burden.”


	3. Chapter 3

They stood by the side of the road, only half hidden in the trees. Bess on her feet, Phillip on his great horse.

He removed a ring from his finger and placed it in a velvet pouch. 

“This is my ring. Keep it close, sweet,” he said, handing it down to her. Bess placed it in her bodice.

His voice rang out. “Look for me by the moonlight, Bess. I will come to you. By the well. The well. Watch for me by the moonlight. Then we must away for a while.”

He ran his hand through her long, loose black hair from root to tips. The red ribbon no longer adorned it. The ribbon was wrapped around a packet artfully hidden in her sleeve.

Then he turned his horse and rode down the road.

Bess saw some of the Lord’s soldiers in the innyard as she returned. They did not often frequent her family’s inn, because they received no warm welcome there. But occasionally they came.

The soldiers entered the inn with her. 

Bess’s father greeted them politely enough, but glanced over at Bess with concern. She tried to compose her features, to calm him.

The soldiers did not return his politeness. They rudely demanded ale. But when Bess made to fetch it, one of them snatched her and pushed her down on the bench next to him. Her father started to protest, but she gave him a signal, and he left to fetch the ale. 

“You have been with the highwayman we seek,” the soldier who pushed her said roughly. He had blond hair and a handsome face, but his blue eyes were hard. “You will be good bait to lure him out. We’ve been hunting him many a long year on behalf of our Lord, and we’ll have his head tonight. Bags of gold have been promised us for’t.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” protested Bess. “I know no highwayman.”

The soldier thrust his hand into her bodice. She shrieked and tried to twist away, but another of them grabbed her arms and held her fast. 

The soldier did not molest her. But he pulled the pouch out from its secret place between her breasts. He opened it and revealed the ring.

“This is his sigil,” said the soldier, showing the ring to the others. 

“I found it lying upon the road,” insisted Bess.

“Maybe you did and maybe you didn’t,” the blond soldier said. “But we heard him tell you to wait for him by the well. So foolish, to cry it in such a loud voice, right by the side of the road! We will wait also, and catch both him and his accomplice.”

The soldiers began singing raucously:

_Then we’ll shoot him down on the highway,  
Down like a dog on the highway,  
And he’ll lie in his blood on the highway, with a bunch of lace at his throat._

She was glad the first part of the trick had worked. Nevertheless, Bess shuddered with revulsion and fear, thinking of what might happen, and the bloodthirsty glee of the soldiers hunting her Phillip.

~~~ 

Bess stood by the well in the moonlight, two soldiers by her side, two more in the shadows. Her hands were tied behind her, underneath her cloak. With many a threat the soldiers told her not to call for help. 

Bess let the little knife fall from her sleeve into her palm and sawed at the rope around her hands. 

“Who is the other we hunt tonight?” said one of the soldiers to the other. He talked across Bess as if she were not there. “The one who is to meet the highwayman. Why do we seek him? How are we to know him?”

“Weren’t you paying attention, man? The highwayman stole something precious from milord, and plans to pass it on to a traitor, a fellow conspirator. He wears a cocked hat with purple plumes. Catch them both, and our rewards will be the heavier.” 

_Tot-a-lot tot-a-lot! The horse-hoofs ringing clear_  
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill  
Tot-a-lot in the frosty silence! Tot-a-lot, in the echoing night! 

When the moon rode highest in the sky, Bess heard the sound of Phillip’s horse. The soldiers soon heard it also. The two standing near her melted into the shadows, and she heard their muskets being readied. 

Bess tossed her head and the hood of the cloak fell back. Her black hair shone in the moonlight. She prayed he would see her, standing where he’d told her to be, to warn him that the soldiers had come.

He did not ride near enough to send her any signal, or for her to pass one on to him. But his horse drew to a halt and paced around noisily. Then she whinnied loudly, and Phillip wheeled and galloped away.

Two of the soldiers sprang for their horses and were after him. 

Bess’s heart was in her throat as she waited, hoping the others would follow. They did not. One stayed by her side, and the other entered the inn. 

She would have to do it. She was afraid and sick with the thought of it. But she would do it. For him. 

“Did you warn him, wench?” cried the soldier by her side.

“How could I have? You were beside me the whole time. Now that he is gone, please let me go! I have done as you asked. You saw that the highwayman does not care for me. I can be of no further use to you.” 

The soldier muttered, but came closer and reached for her arms.

Bess rubbed against him. “I want you,” she said seductively. “Come away. I know a private place.”

The soldier was startled but intrigued. “You don’t want me to untie you first?”

“No, being bound makes me burn! I need you now.”

“But I’m supposed to be watching for —“

“It needn’t take long, I am already wet for you. Come.”

The soldier followed her to a secret place.

As he kissed her and fumbled with his breeches, she let the cut bindings fall from her wrist. The red ribbon slithered from inside her sleeve into her hand. She wrapped the ribbon around his neck and choked him until he passed out. Then she tied and gagged him. 

His body was heavy, but she was strong. She dragged him into the shed and locked it.

She quickly returned to the tavern, lurking outside in the dark back yard. When her father entered the yard on some errand, she accosted him from behind, clamping a hand around his mouth.

“It’s Bess,” she hissed. “I am well and free. Say nothing.”

He slumped in relief as he hears her voice, and she turned him to face her. She explained only what he needs to know, and begged him to tell no one else.

In the empty shared bedroom, she tied up her hair into a cloth, and smeared a dark mark across her face. Then she donned a hood that partially hid her face, and entered the tavern the back way.

The blond soldier was watching the front door. 

Bess snatched a full flagon of ale from Caerwen as she tried to sidle past. “I’m sorry, sister,” Bess said “That soldier has demanded to be served immediately. You know he could get us in trouble if we don’t do exactly as he wants.”

“Bess!” hissed her sister. “Where have you been? And why are you dressed like that? You look hideous!”

“I’ve had moon pains. The boy from Landshall farm is harassing me. I’m trying to look unappealing.”

“Well it’s working! Have a care, or you’ll put off the other customers too.” 

“I love you, too.” She whirled and set off with the stolen flagon. Caerwen was annoyed but did not protest the theft. She turned to fetch another flagon, and did not notice the packet that slipped from Bess’s sleeve into her hand, or the powder that spilled from the packet into the flagon that Bess carried. 

“On the house, fair young soldier,” Bess said, putting the flagon in front of him, and putting an ugly hoarseness into her voice, the way Phillip taught her. “I wouldn’t mind a roll in the hay with the likes o’ye.” She gave a twisted smile.

“Eugh!” snapped the blond soldier. “Get away from me, ugly hag!” He immediately took a long swig from the flagon, as if this would clear away his memory of the unpleasant witch. 

When, shortly after, he began to vomit and stumble, Bess’s father and sisters hauled him off to the stable and laid him in an empty stall, to sleep off his drink where his foul emissions would annoy no one. 

Bess removed her disguise, plaiting a green ribbon into her hair. She took up her serving duties, keeping a weather eye on the door.

“You decided the Landshall boy was worthy after all?” Caerwen teased when she saw the transformation. 

“He’s too drunk to try anything now,” Bess assured her. 

Then she saw a stranger enter the inn. The purple plumes on the hat in his hand seemed to glow in the firelight. His traveling-cloak was dusty and the clothing underneath nondescript, but his eye was keen and bright.

“Soldiers? Strangers wearing purple feathers in their hats? Our humble inn is a mysterious gathering place this night,” remarked Caerwen. “All we need now is a visit from the highwayman. Or the Lord himself, Heaven forfend.” 

“I shall serve him, sister. I returned late and I know you are fatigued.” 

“You do that. We are all annoyed at your tardiness,” Caerwen replied tartly. “You’re doing most of the cleanup tonight as well.”

As Bess served the stranger, he took hold of one of her plaits, drawing it through his fingers. “You look well with this green ribbon in your braid, young woman,” he said. 

“May I look upon your fine hat, sir? I have never before seen such a lovely set of plumes.”

A small envelope slipped out of her sleeve and into her hand. When she offered the hat back to the stranger, his hand went to cover that same envelope, which he slipped into his breast. With his other hand, he raised hers to his lips. 

After finishing only the one flagon, he disappeared into the night.

~~~

Bess finished the nightly chores alone, as penance for arriving late. The moon had almost set when she climbed into bed with her two sisters. And as soon as they returned to their slumbers, snoring softly around her, she climbed back out again. 

“Moon pains,” she said when they protest at the disturbance. “You’ll be happier if I use the privy outside.”

At the privy, she changed into a pair of breeches, then walked past the well, and the kissing place, to the highway, where she waited, concealed behind a stone.

_Tot-a-lot! Tot-a-lot!_

In the black night, the blacker horse slowed to a walk and then stopped upon the road. 

“Who goes there in the darkness?” said a voice, quiet and hoarse, but masculine. “My horse sensed you and is skittish.” 

“I beg your pardon, traveler. I am here seeking a red ribbon I have lost.” 

“Mount up, then. I know where there are more.”

“I will go with you, stranger, but I must return here anon. My family needs me.”

Phillip helped Bess mount the great horse. She took the reins as he taught her. She sat between his legs and his body pressed hotly against her back. His hands slid around her body to her breasts, and then one slipped into her breeches and cupped her sex, gathering the moisture there and withdrawing. 

He licked his palm and she twisted to take his mouth with hers, scenting herself on his lips. 

“If all goes well, a change will come to this country soon,” Phillip said as his horse again began to walk along the highway. “I hope we may return at lambing season.”

**Author's Note:**

> The nonbinary character dresses and passes as a man and uses he/him pronouns. He also states, "I am not simply a man or a woman. I am both, and neither, and something else entirely." He has breasts and a vulva and wears a strap-on. In one short, non-explicit sex scene he receives breast play and cunnilingus.


End file.
